Sidekick data may be retrievable after all

Updated 1:03 p.m.: T-Mobile said it will give affected Sidekick customers a $100 gift card. “This will be in addition to the free month of data service that already went to Sidekick data customers,” T-Mobile said.

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T-Mobile said late Monday that it and Microsoft may be able to retrieve the personal data of Sidekick smartphone users who lost it during last week’s Microsoft server outage.

“Regarding those of you who have lost personal content, T-Mobile and Microsoft/Danger continue to do all we can to recover and return any lost information,” T-Mobile said in the announcement. “Recent efforts indicate the prospects of recovering some lost content may now be possible. We will continue to keep you updated on this front; we know how important this is to you.”

A server outage last week at Microsoft subsidiary Danger, which runs the Sidekick data services, cut off service to hundreds of thousands of T-Mobile Sidekick users. Those users were still able to use services provided by T-Mobile, such as calling, text messaging and SMS.

This past weekend, T-Mobile and Microsoft said personal data was most likely lost for users who reset their Sidekicks during the outage. The event, as mobile-industry analyst Azita Arvani said Monday, has put “a huge black eye on the cloud-computing services, in general.”